Ditchling 20th Jan

Hi All,
Today we arranged to meet at Ditchling Beacon car park at 9:00 - 9:30 , the forecast was NNE but the hill was saying different. Paul crossed the road to try to NE hill with his Zulu but was soon back as it didn't work. That was the test which decided us what models to take, it was obviously a day for large wing area or very light / DLG stuff.
There were 8 of us today despite the freezing conditions - Paul, Ian, Scott, Jim, Graham U, Robin A and Robin S plus me.
On reaching the usual flying place Paul launched his green mouldie but decided to walk East a bit to get better lift - we all followed with bags and models, etc.....
Once we decided on a place, we were able to make use of the not very good lift with a variety of models from Graham , Paul and Ian's mouldies to Robin S with his 2 channel glider and Scotty and Robin A with DLGs.
I only had the 2.5 mtr Impulse which I asked Paul to trim as it was sitting around for about a year. I then took control and had Paul help me by talking me through the A test and talking me down through 2 pretty good landings - much obliged Paul.
Meantime everyone else was flying a variety of models and having pretty good lift (which had improved a bit after 30 minutes), Scott's DLG and Robin S's 2 channel were way up there soaring in the thermals (what there were), and Graham, Paul and Ian were carving things up with their large mouldies. At one time I think there were 7 models flying at once .
Paul helped Jim maiden the Cobra but it had a broken servo mount and had to go home !
Scotty maidened his Kloudrider with help from Paul on the landing and it was pretty good.

Robin S flew both of his 2 channel gliders, but a hard landing in the very cold weather took its toll on the old Apex whereby the fuselage snapped pretty cleanly through - he was warned about it being brittle in the cold ! I hear subsequently that it's now all fixed up.
That was the only casualty (and Jim's servo mount), so a good day.
By 11:00 ish we were all too cold to carry on (except Graham U who stayed for a while).
All told I had a great time and was able to put my nerves to one side for a while to execute 2 good landings.
Hopefully everyone had a good time and thanks to all who came.

Rob